The Pumpkin Spice Must Flow

So after decades of hiding the facts and sidestepping the issue, our favorite Federally-funded arm of the commercial chemical industry— the FDA — has at last grudgingly admitted that practically all chicken meat sold in the United States now contains everyone’s favorite poultry seasoning: arsenic. And at no extra cost to the consumer! Actually, it makes no sense that we AREN’T being charged extra for all that yummy arsenic… especially since it’s being introduced into the chicken feed, and therefore into the chicken meat itself— on purpose.

Now the FDA has finally been forced to admit its own research confirms that quantities of arsenic— legally added to industrial chicken feed for the past 60 years— eventually end up in the bodies of humans. Yum.

As recently as last summer (before a new study incontrovertibly proved the connection beyond reasonable doubt) the poultry industry and the FDA continued to vehemently deny that arsenic fed to chickens ended up in chicken meat and assured consumers that every last bit of that arsenic was “excreted in the chicken feces.” Not that there’s ever been much scientific basis for making that claim— it’s always been wishful thinking on the part of the poultry industry.

The new evidence is so blatant and undeniable that chicken feed product manufacturer Alpharma LLC is pulling its primary product— Roxarsone— off the shelves. Who the heck is Alpharma? Why, they are a corporate subsidiary of our old friends at Pfizer chemicals, of course. And even though Alpharma has grudgingly agreed to pull their poisonous feed chemical off the shelves in the USA, it remains reluctant to remove it from feed products overseas unless forced by foreign regulators to do so.

Meanwhile the FDA continues its campaign of denial, assuring Americans that arsenic levels in chickens are at such low levels that it’s still safe to eat. The National Chicken Council(yes, that is a real thing) agrees with the FDA, because profits. They even released a formal statement that “Chicken is safe to eat!” (while admitting that in something like 80% of American chicken meat, at least some arsenic would probably be involved).

Arsenic… it’s what’s for dinner. 🙂

Fortunately, the FDA is cracking down on such deadly products as elderberry juice and raw milk, which are being classified as “dangerously unregulated drugs.” Possibly because they don’t contain an appropriately-high level of arsenic, or whatever crazy rules the FDA are following at the moment.

But don’t worry; just because you don’t eat much chicken isn’t any reason to think you won’t get your fair share of FDA-approved arsenic! Chicken litter containing arsenic is ALSO fed to cows in factory beef operations. So all those arsenic-saturated chicken droppings get recycled and fed to cows… which, unsurprisingly, get ground up into hamburger containing that same magic ingredient.

So our burgers are tainted by poisonous chicken-shit. Great. But never fear! If there was anything dangerous about that, I’m sure our stalwart pals at the FDA would waste no time telling us not to worry about all the arsenic we eat.